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Not sure if I should be posting this here or on the sites part of the forum ....

We were really lucky this year in that we managed to get two weeks of sun and relative warmth by following the best weather forecasts.  In order to do that though we covered around 1200 miles.

We're thinking about trying camping in France next year but the thought of all the driving, especially with the price of diesel, is putting us off.  It would take us a full day just to get to the tunnel.  We wondered whether it would be better to get a ferry from North Shields to Amsterdam and drive to France from there.  Has anyone else tried this?  We don't know anyone who has so maybe its a bad idea??

Just exploring our options.  Oh yes, will need to take French language lessons too.

Hi, probably the best place to post would be the Caravanning and Camping Abroad section, someone there will be able to help you.

Why not stay in Holland instead of driving all the way to France?

The Dutch are big campers (no jokes!!) and have lots of sites - Angelicminx or Freebird are sure to be along soon and could let you know about Holland I'm sure. the weather must be better there than here.

We drive from N. Ireland to France - and it's worth every mile

This year it took us 2 days to go via Dublin - Holyhead and Portsmouth - Le Havre. I would recommend the latter route as a fairly cheap way of getting to the sunny West Coast (Vendee / Royan / Bordeaux), with only a days driving on the far side.

I look at it this way - it would take an extra day each way farther than Cornwall - whats 2 days out of 2 weeks when you consider what you're getting extra ? 350 miles from North East to Portsmouth, then 300 miles from Le Havre to Les Sables D'Olonne - 1300 miles round trip, virtually the same as you did this year !

We live in North Yorks - looked at Hull - Zebrugge but expensive. We drove down to Folkstone and stayed at the new Holiday Inn Express, £49 for a room that slept our family of 4 (very comfortably). It is about 1 mile from Tunnel entrance so we were on the tunnel by 0645 next morning with a packed breakfast they had provided. Can recommend.

We went to SW France and if going that way again I would probably do an over night Portsmouth crossing - they were fully booked by the time we looked this year.

If going to SE France then I would repeat what we did this year.

My in laws always do Hull Zeebrugge but then it is just the 2 of them and money isn't a factor!

I live in Hull and the North Sea ferry is the answer but not in summer! Off season you can travel 2 people and a car for up to 5 days for less than £100 return-in high season this goes to about £400+ in summer! Great route but hellishly expensive. We drive past it and go via Dover in the summer!

We went to France last year and stopped near Dieppe Normandy great camp site called La Source.

We went in August and only paid £19 each way with Norfork line (car and up to 4 adults).

This must be the cheapest way to get there?

My return journey from Sheffield to Dieppe was about 800 miles not much more than going to south west Cornwall.

I reckon the total return cost was about £120 for petrol and ferry crossing, camping was about £18 per night.

Bargain, cheaper than stopping in this country, shame it rained most of the time.

I suppose we need to travel further south to get the weather.

All the best.

Thanks all for your tips.  It's given us some ideas to research to keep me occupied through the winter.   We'd wondered about camping in Holland and I quite fancy a cycling holiday so could combine the two - but maybe have to get our youngest off his stabilisers first.

Thanks again.

Hi Milly,

We camp regularly in France & live in the NE, so like you we have to do a day's driving before we even get out of the country.

Have looked at the Nothern ferries in the past, but found them either expensive, too long a trip or still leaving a long drive at the other end.

We do one of these options these days:

• Take Dover-Calais ferry & get an hour's kip.
• Portmouth-St Malo overnight with a cabin - 6-7 hrs kip
• Portsmouth-Caen with cabin - 5-6 hrs kip
• Plymouth-Roscoff, cabin, 6-7 hrs kip

St Malo & Roscoff Ferries obviously dearer, but not too bad if you stay out of peak times. But being Brittany Ferries vessels the food is superb and cheap - well up to restaurant standard.

Getting to France is worth it all though! 

Hi

If you search on the internet you can find nice B&Bs in France and not particularly expensive. We've done this a couple of times to break up the journey. Alot also do an evening meal.

Jen